Wind cried and waves crashed at his feet and Ho recognised the voice of his island

Wind cried and waves crashed at his feet and Ho recognised the voice of his island. It takes strength to end the dream. Laughter remains in my ears over muted drums. I sit on a matted floor under the roof of a large meeting hall beneath a twilight sky. Standing before me is a line of village girls and behind them a band of drummers. Wide smiles and hips swaying in time with the drummers, faster—a blur of green ti skirts. Further behind, several rows deep, are crowds staring not at the performance but at me. Eyes wide with awe, as if I am more than a man. More than a chief. A god.

Shadows from the dancers fall on my legs, cast by the last of the sun. I feel satisfied, warmed by the ritual of the moment. I want to stay in this place despite the throbbing in my face—a pain and reminder—of a broken body awaiting my spirit’s return. Coconut oil and candlenut leaves, the scent of it, keep me afloat. One sense after another wakes, filling me like waves washing into a tidal pool. My stomach yawns open. The bodies of the women are tempting, but it is real and earnest hunger for food that I desire.

Villagers lay down gifts before me: banana leaves filled with strips of roasted pig and chicken, steamed crayfish, clay-baked pigeons, smoked eel, kumara and taro. All this bounty, from forest to sea, is presented around a full-grown Moa. My mouth waters. Seeing it, the rarity of it, marks the occasion as something extraordinary—certainly equal to a chief’s wedding feast. And it is all for me. But why?

I look to either side of the dancers where chiefs and nobles stare back stonily. Smiles faded along with the remaining daylight. One of them rises onto thick legs, hobbles over, and sets a gourd at my feet. I pour the heavy blue drink into my shell. A strong voice from the back shouts ‘Puga!’ I nod at the nobles, the gift accepted, and drink from my cup.

Candlenut torches are lit and tied to beams by young warriors. Another voice announces, ‘the light!’ Flames bends and sways with the dancers. All before me slows while a weight descends upon my brow, as if a fairy has decided to rest along that soft ridge. The blue dust muted everything—even the gods. When the drumming subsides, the distant shore returns to my ears, both here and there. The puga takes hold, numbs me to where I see only the dance: bodies scented with oils, hair adorned with flowers, leafy hips moving faster. Takaroa crashes in waves of approval between the drumbeats. Each hand, each gesture, matches the words of a song I cannot hear over the shore.

A second noble, older, steps from the shadows. His face tells me his mana is high, though his tribe is unknown to me. Thin parallel lines stretch from chin to neck and below, honouring his ancestors and their homelands along a mighty river. He kneels beside me, extracting a fresh piece of puga from the hilt of his maro. A warm smile turns to a grimace while the elder grinds the coral into the thick of his palm. A turn of hand reveals the blue powder briefly before it escapes between fingers into my shell.

The fine food, the moa, dancers and nobles from opposing tribes, all sharing puga—they’re celebrating something—but it is as if they are waiting on me to act first? Who was I again?

A heavy rumble shakes the ground beneath. Takali Foto, the volcano god, overseeing all on the island now speaks from the south. One of the dancer’s moves ahead, hips a blur, matching the shaking of the volcano. She steps into light. Her brilliant green eyes shine through the dark and through me. As she approaches I recognise her. Selai the healer, most famous in all of Kafiki Island. The woman I once loved. She dances closer still, smiling. Her scent is the same. I read her chest of noble bloodlines tattooed in the style of her tribe, curling up past her long neck and chin ending above her lips.

She speaks to me. Mouth pushing out words that fail to carry except, ‘my son.’ Everything else is muted by the crash of waves onto rocks. Takaroa, the god of oceans, calls to me. And before Selai can finish Takali Foto shakes this world apart leaving a thick black swallowing all I see.

Ho tried to open his eyes, but they were sealed shut like a pipi. Pain welcomed him everywhere, the worst of it kept for his swollen, broken face. Lesser sensations murmured beneath the roar of his wounds: a full bladder, hollow hunger, parched mouth, dull ache along his sides, and finally an erect tira—passageway for his returning spirit. He scraped his eyes clear and sniffed his sticky fingers, the scent of blood lingered.

Sitting up on his elbows was effort enough to bring sweat to his skin. Weak and trembling, Ho wondered if he was sick or already dying. When he touched his nose, the bridge shifted beneath his fingers; his jaw bulged, heavy and numb. Blood crusted at the corner of his mouth. A memory of angry gods stirred him, and he looked about, unsure if he was truly alone. He recognised the outcropping of rock among the breakers as his favoured crabbing spot. Behind him rose the dunes and the way south, while east and west lay an empty beach. It was high tide. A strong easterly tugged at the tops of the swells, and the air hung heavy with the promise of rain. Relieved to be alone, he lay back to rest a while, listening to the waves.

‘Get up.’

Get up!’

‘Get up, boy!’

Ho kept resting, humming a tune he loved, trying to drown out the sound of the ocean.

‘Get up, Ho!’

“Why?” He turned his head to the side and shouted at the waves, “Why should I get up? Have you found an empty waka for me to sail away in yet?”

‘Get up, Ho!’

“If not, I should just lie here and let my spirit escape for good!”

‘Get up, Ho—rise up, child. A storm approaches. Tāwhiri, my brother, intends to wipe you from this island!’

Ho called out to the sea god again, “Please, Takaroa! Give me a sign that my time on this rock has ended! I’ve had enough—I had enough five seasons past!”

‘Consider his presence the sign. Rise, or be taken. Must I send another flock of seagulls to peck and pull and wake you from your idleness? You ate all thirty in a week.’

“I am the lazy one?”

Waves swirled dangerously beyond the reef as the storm announced itself in rolling thunder from the east. Finally, as if charged by the thunder itself, Ho rose. “Welcome, Tāwhiri!” he smiled, lips cracking and bleeding. “So glad you could join me here on my little rock!” He searched the skies above for the wounds of Loha and Arahuta, but all he saw was the coming of Tāwhiri in clouds of threat. From hands and knees, Ho struggled upright and lurched forward a few steps until steady. Back on his feet, Ho laughed and shouted up to the rolling heavens, “Do you hear me, great god of storms?”

Tāwhiri, a god forever angered in separation from his earth mother and sky father, replied from the east in a ferocious gust, needling heavy rain into him. “Is this it then?” Ho shouted above the screaming winds. “First, the gods starved me for a month, then they shot two down from another sky to end me. And now you want a go? I’m right here storm god, take me away!”

Tāwhiri’s reply was wordless, yet its force was immediate. The storm rose, battering wave, beach, and Ho alike. He leaned low into the eastern gale, fighting only to keep his footing. Then he dug his toes into the sand and faced the tempest, opening his chest and those old wounds so his temper might also rise—carried higher still by his own fury.

Shouting into the wind, he addressed the enemy: “What have I done to offend you? All my life I have proclaimed your names in every breath! When I struck down an enemy, I thanked the god of war instead of my own strength. When I hunted moa, I thanked the forest gods, not my aim. When I fished a whale, I thanked Takaroa, not my carved spear. When I harvested kumara, I thanked the guardian of crops, not the slaves who buried the tubers. Have I left a god unpraised? Was it the birth gods I ignored, failing to thank them for delivering me into captivity? If so, I will never be grateful for it!”

Above him, the black cloud answered with thunder.

“Blow me away, then!” he cried, turning south toward the dunes, waving himself into the wind. “Here—look! I’m ready to pay for my offences in spirit! Haul it away, so my body remains a feast for the crabs upon this beach!”

CRACK!

Lightning struck a coconut palm above the dunes, only thirty paces away, splitting it like kindling. Tāwhiri has a poor aim with his lightning, Ho thought. Either that, or he means not to kill. Deciding not to provoke the storm god further, he turned toward the lagoon, seeking the westward path that led to the palm grove where he had built his home. Ho climbed the sand and limped into the jungle stretch toward the lagoon. Lightning struck another palm, sending branches and shards of trunk flying. He dodged the first, but was hurled from his footing by the second and third. Ho shook himself free of the branches and rose just as another bolt struck the debris he had left behind.

Each step was exhausting. Running felt foreign, as if his legs had forgotten what they were made to do. Did the fight with Arahuta and Loha kill me—is this my freed spirit now roaming. Then he remembered Kalapa. Where did I leave my spear? Ho rounded the lagoon bay, eyes scanning for his favoured friend, when something struck his shoulder—THUD! And again upon his head—WHACK! Startled, he braced for another blow from this unseen foe but saw instead two fish flapping on the sand.

He picked up the nearest. “A good-sized snapper!”

Looking skyward to ask the question, Ho was rained on by a large feke in answer.
Slap! It immediately wrapped his face in its many arms. Blinded, Ho tore at the tentacles, peeling the creature from his skin. Each sucker left a burning ring, and he hurled it far into the lagoon as more fish rained down around him. Ho lurched forward on legs threatening to fold. Fish flew from all sides. He covered his head with his hands, trying to shield himself from the downpour.

Again, his wairua wavered, a waka drifting too long without a home to hoe toward. When he reached the shelter of the trees, his head felt split like the top of the coconut shell. The severing of body and spirit continued, sawing at the umbilical cord attaching his desire to this world, over the next. Tāwhiri drove more fish before him, each one a blow upon his weary body. Ho dropped to his knees beneath the fury of the atua, wondering if this was vengeance for his long defiance of the gods.

His sight began to fade; he knew now that the storm was fishing for his spirit. “Please, Tāwhiri! I am on the hook—but I will not fight you. Take my life, so I may escape this cursed island once and for all!” The world spun. His balance left him. He fell to the ground in a heap as the fish continued to pile.